


For you I'll build a lighthouse

by Achromos



Category: Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor (Video Games), TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Oranges, Pining, Reunions, Sea-longing, Suspension Of Disbelief, Valinor, Waiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 06:55:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17017875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Achromos/pseuds/Achromos
Summary: Celebrimbor opened his eyes to the light of Valinor in his second life, the last thought he had held tightly in his mind like a key, a memento, a lover's token. He needed to get to the shore.





	For you I'll build a lighthouse

**Author's Note:**

> I literally wrote this in one sitting, writing like a madman for like two hours. Not edited at all. Still, I had to do it.
> 
> Basically, this is the other, much shorter version of "Here, in Paradise", where they take the normal ways to Aman.
> 
> Enjoy!

Celebrimbor opened his eyes to the light of Valinor in his second life, the last thought he had held tightly in his mind like a key, a memento, a lover's token. He needed to get to the shore.

"How much time has passed?" he asked the attending healer who stood by as he awoke. The room he was in was large, an overarching ceiling like a dome hanging above from which ivies like stalactites grew. There were a few others lying about, still asleep, waiting for their second lives to begin.

"Time passes differently in Aman – there is no way of telling," the healer replied and began telling him about the life that waited for him in the Undying Lands. She knew his name and his history, telling him that his family had been notified of his return. If he so wished, a place of residence could be assigned to him until a time that he either built his own or joined his family's. He only listened with half an ear.

"I need transportation to the harbor," he interrupted her. She looked at him strangely but said that she would arrange for it.

He waited, eating fruit sweeter than anything he could remember, drinking water that was more refreshing than he thought possible. They had given him clothes that fit, made from soft material and in a style that he didn't recognize. A new life indeed.

The healer returned a while later, telling him that a carriage with wares destined for Tol Eressëa had been found, and its driver had agreed to take him. Celebrimbor thanked her and left the place where he had awoken, stepping out onto the streets of Valimar. The city was beautiful, but he had no eyes for the gilded houses and silver paved streets. He found the carriage driver and thanked her, not just for agreeing to drive him, but also for not asking too many questions.

As they left, Celebrimbor thought he saw the healer who had attended him watching. He wondered for a moment what she thought, but then he turned back to watch the road that would take him to shore. The quicker the better, and so he did not distract his driver with inane chatter. After millennia spent as a Wraith, he barely knew how one would go about such a thing anyway.

The journey took several days, bringing them past lush meadows, rich forests, abundant fields and bustling cities. They passed Tirion upon Túna's bone white spires, and Celebrimbor spared them a few moments of wistful contemplation.

To the Sea.

He thought upon the irony of this sort of reverse sea-longing. While they drove, sometimes letting the horses rest or exchanging them for fresh ones, Celebrimbor kept himself oriented on the strange pull that drove him to the shore. His driver asked not, but he knew she had noticed. How could she not, when he felt compelled to voice his urgency, longing and desperation in song. He may not be the greatest poet, but surely even he could express the pressure that drove, nay, pulled him forward in a way that a stranger may understand.

When finally, they boarded a ferry to carry them to Tol Eressëa, a sort of relief fell upon Celebrimbor. Here she was. The Sea. It was not yet the shore, but her waters soothed him, nonetheless. His companion offered no words as he parted from her to take the last leg of his journey alone. She did, however, gift him a single orange from a crate that she had been transporting. He pocketed it, hoping it may keep long enough to share it later.

Celebrimbor had to pass through Kôrtirion to get to his destination and took the opportunity to ask around for a lonely ship and its singular passenger. No one had heard of it, so he hastened his steps. He was not too late. In his mind, he imagined standing at the pier to welcome the vessel and its treasured cargo home, as he should.

In contrast to the places before, Avallonë did not pass by him in a feverish blur, for she held his destination within. Already, he could smell the sea salt, imagined feeling the spray on his face. His hair whipped about with the breeze, and he could not help smiling when he finally reached the pier. The pier, where ships docked after travelling the Straight Road, the only way that connected Middle-Earth to Aman. There were none docked there now, and the place was deserted, the tower next to it pale and quiet. He felt elated, nonetheless. This is where he was to wait.

Days passed, and he finally let himself realize that things may not happen as quickly as he thought.

Had he been reborn so quickly? Surely, the wounds upon his fëa had been extensive? And there was no way to tell, as nobody kept time in the Undying Lands. What should they keep it for? And even if they did, there was no knowing how the passage of time on these shores corresponded to events in Middle-Earth. Even less so for vessels travelling the Straight Road.

As Celebrimbor slowly settled, he came to speak with others who also waited. They told him stories of other travelers that had sailed, telling of a strange bending of the mind while out on Sea. How reality lost meaning as they were – judged? Measured? Transported? Granted entry? Nobody really knew, and most did not think on it much more. All that mattered was that they should be reunited with their loved ones, and it was so always.

Celebrimbor had the horrible thought that perhaps the vessel he waited for should not dock at the pier at all. It had not originated from the Grey Havens, after all, and it may not land where the ships that sailed from there did. So, he went to the shore proper, and settled in to wait there.

In his pocket, the orange he had been gifted was still fresh, but he worried. It felt like holding a time piece. Once it went bad, he feared, he would lose hope. Did its skin feel a little drier? Did it not smell so fragrant anymore? Perhaps its flesh was no longer succulent and full of juice. Should he eat it? Replace it? He pocketed it again, smelling the sweet fragrance on his own fingers.

He found a rock upon which to sit, the sandy shores stretching to his left and right. He had great vision from here, the pier visible on his right, the endless horizon of the Sea bared before him like an open maw without teeth. Waves lapped at the beach, sometimes threatening to tickle his feet, sometimes buffeting gently against the sand further away. Rain swept in from the Sea, weighing him down, and still he waited. He thought perhaps he should build a shelter. Yes, just something to protect him from the elements a little. A roof, some walls.

He was afraid to turn his back on the Sea, every second spent not looking at her could be the moment a tall sail may appear there, and he might miss it, might not be there to witness as it emerged, growing larger and closer with every heartbeat. Still, he went away and paying with knowledge, he bought a few tools. The wood he gathered himself, felling a few great pines that grew not far away. From those, he fashioned a hut that crouched over the stone where he had been sitting. There, now he would not have to worry about rain anymore.

Sat under his shelter, he would look out onto the Sea, sometimes enjoying the sweet smell of the orange that never seemed to wither.

More days passed, blending into months. He could no longer ignore other needs aside from shelter, offering his expertise and skill wherever he could to trade. He only asked that he may conduct his business near the shore, always keeping a vigilant eye on the horizon. Soon enough, the locals knew of him, counted him among those who were waiting.

Then, one day, a sail appeared. Celebrimbor cried with relief, lying to himself about the shape of it. The color was wrong, but perhaps – it may still be – could it?

It was not.

The ship brought a group of Elves, spilling them onto the pier with laughter and joy. Celebrimbor wept as he witnessed daughters and sons rejoining their parents. Children seeing their siblings, now grown, so different from their memory. Friends embracing their lost confidantes. Lovers kissing; reunited after so long.

After that ship, Avallonë was emptier than before. Those who were waiting were fewer than before. Celebrimbor did not wait with them anymore. His ship would not land upon the pier.

As if a dam had been broken, after that first ship more and more began cresting the horizon, sometimes even small fleets of them. Avallonë drained and refilled with families, coming in only to sweep away the long-awaited loved ones. Celebrimbor did not pay them any mind anymore.

His hut started to show signs of weathering after a while – a long time, he would not lie to himself, could not deny it – and he contemplated building something more permanent.

In the moments of restful reverie that he granted himself, he began to think of horrors. What if a vessel might enter the Straight Road and never leave it? Could one veer off course? How long did the journey really take? He now knew that this sudden surge of ships coming in were those that had been fleeing from the growing Evil. This was still years before the recovery of the One Ring, decades before his battle with Sauron that resulted in the Great Eye on Barad-dûr's battlements. An eternity before the end of the War of the Ring.

Well then, an eternity he could wait. He would. He'd have to.

Celebrimbor no longer spent every waking and dreaming hour of his time gazing at the horizon, despite the sick guilt that gnawed at his stomach and his mind until all he saw in his reveries were wooden splinters and blood spilled on a white sail. Still, he worked harder until he could afford to trade all his accumulated favors for the material he needed.

Beginning with a foundation of rock and superstitiously adding elements of his pine wood hut, he began to build upon the sandy shore. In between his work, in moments of rest and respite as he gently cradled the still sweet orange, he knew that people were talking. Some came looking, some passed by and paused. None ever spoke to him, but he heard them.

The Lonely Watcher, they called him, and they invented stories about him. Why he was waiting. Who he waited for. Why they had not arrived yet.

Celebrimbor feared he knew, and still he clung to hope, rubbing his fingers against the peel of an orange that should long have rotted away. All the while he built, spiraling up and up and up into the sky, until it was taller than the tower of Avallonë. He was no stone mason, but he knew enough about how things worked, and he'd been friends with enough dwarves to glean a thing or two to construct this tower. A tower that had no roof, no rooms, but winding stairs and a receptacle instead. It would not be finished until he made that which fit into it. But for that he'd need more time, and materials.

He began making other things. Mechanical contraptions so fine and delicate and intricate they fooled children into thinking they were real birds. He made things that measured time. He made things that could tell weight and volume more precisely than any heretofore known device. He sold them, traded them, until he had everything he needed.

He asked the smith to let him have use of his anvil just for a few days. The smith yielded, in exchange for a hammer that weighed nothing, yet hit as if it were as heavy as a mountain.

When Celebrimbor was done, he held in his hands a piece of the sun. He did not listen to the smith as he cried at its beauty. He did not heed the whispers that followed him on his way to his tower that proclaimed that a fourth Silmaril had been made. They had never seen a Silmaril, this was no such thing. It was only a thing that glowed, and glowed brightly enough to pierce fog, to pierce the night, perhaps to pierce the Straight Road itself. The tower of Avallonë had been made to watch out for incoming ships. But his tower. His shining beacon was made to call them home. To call _him_ home.

He put it in its receptacle and settled back into his wait, surrounded by the fragrance of oranges that never withered.

One day a special ship landed at the pier of Avallonë, special enough to capture Celebrimbor's notice and curiosity. For the first time since its completion he left his tower to observe those who had arrived.

His heart seized at the sight of Galadriel, his dear friend. It ached when he saw Elrond, whom he had not known well, but knew much of. He wept bitter tears when he saw that they were accompanied by two mortals. Small they were and weary, but even the salty, thick air of Tol Eressëa seemed to improve their strength. He wept, seeing that they had been touched by the One.

He wept, for his heart knew hope again.

There were mortals on these shores now, and they had been granted passage through the Straight Road. There was hope, and as he hid his face behind his hands, he tasted oranges. No one noticed as he slipped away, back to his tower.

The next morning, someone ascended the winding stairs, coming to stand quietly next to him, where wind whipped, and the beacon shone brightly.

"We saw this light," she said in her gentle manner. "We saw it and headed for it, knowing that our journey was at its end."

He said nothing, his eyes trained on the horizon.

"Who is it you are waiting for?"

"My heart," he whispered, his voice rough and thin with disuse.

Her hand, radiating warmth, settled heavily on his shoulder and he shivered. He had not known that he was so cold.

"The Straight Road is perilous to take," she said. "But you see that it is not impossible, even for those who are not of the Eldar."

How she knew, he would never know. She always knew these things. So, he said nothing, only covering her warm hand with his cold one. They waited together for a while, until there was a call from below. She descended the stairs to speak to whoever was there, and then she brought them back up with her.

"Do you mind if we wait with you?"

Celebrimbor tore his gaze from the horizon to regard Galadriel and her daughter.

"There is no roof, and I have no chairs for you," he said. They smiled.

"We need no roof, no chairs, nothing at all," Celebrían replied in her mother's stead. "We only need a place to wait for my father. And this place is as good as any."

And so, they waited together. At first in silence, and then Celebrimbor began to cherish their voices in the background, whispering to and fro in the wind. They were brought things, and they made things, like he had kept making mechanical things that came to his mind like stitch work seemed to come to Celebrían or the weave of fabric to Galadriel. Eventually, they came to have a roof after all, and a rug and warm blankets and chairs. Celebrimbor was not so cold anymore.

The stars wheeled overhead in their slow dance when Celebrimbor saw that there were fewer of them than there should be.

"A ship," Galadriel said.

The wind brought with it the sharp sweetness of oranges, and Celebrimbor knew. He flew down the steps, breathless with joy, with fear, with a terrible, terrible feeling. His feet carried him across the beach, to the water, and he jumped into the freezing cold waves without a second thought.

The ship's sails were tattered, and it listed to one side. Still, it surged forward, stubborn and desperate. Celebrimbor met it with equal fervor, dashing through the waves with the strength and determination that let him build a tower, that let him steal sunlight for himself.

When he climbed aboard the teetering vessel, he thought for a terrible moment that it was empty.

"Took me long enough."

He cried out in joy at the sound of this voice, beloved and missed dearly.

"Talion," he laughed, the salty sea water on his cheeks indistinguishable from his tears as he ignored all protests and pulled him into a bruising embrace. His frame was thin against his, and feverishly hot even in contrast to his cold seawater-soaked body.

"Celebrimbor."

They both laughed and cried, clinging to each other as if never intending to let go. His memory had not let him forget, but still he traced Talion's beloved features with his fingertips, still smelling of oranges. Talion chased them with kisses, drowned between sobs and hiccups of laughter.

Their bodies were shaken when the boat scraped against the sandy shore, Celebrimbor clinging to Talion's steadily weakening form, as if he had clung on to wakefulness by sheer will.

"We are home," he whispered, brushing wet hair from Talion's forehead. "You made it. You're home."

"I know," he replied, blinking gently, his gaze drawn past Celebrimbor, where the beacon shone from the top of his tower. "I saw."

That day he left Avallonë with Talion in his arms, finally turning his back on the Sea for the last time. His tower still stood, calling home any who took the Straight Road. Those who still waited gazed upon it with the knowledge that it would guide them, hasten their journey into the arms of those who loved them.

It did not take long for the last ship to arrive.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you very much for reading.


End file.
